Kasabian pay tribute to Rik Mayall at intimate charity gig for War Child

The band played London's O2 Shepherds Bush Empire ahead of huge Leicester homecoming show

Kasabian played an intimate charity show at London’s O2 Shepherds Bush Empire last night (June 18), paying tribute to the late Rik Mayall at the the end of the show.

Before launching into ‘Fire’, which closed the main body of the set, singer Tom Meighan declared that they were “gonna play this one for Rik Mayall”, the iconic comedian and star of The Young Ones who recently passed away.

Earlier that night Kasabian kicked off the gig, which was raising money for War Child, with recent offering ‘Bumblebee’. Meighan emerged wearing giant, bug-like sunglasses while guitarist Serge Pizzorno donned a pair of skeleton trousers and a T-shirt bearing the numbers ’48:13′ – the name of their current album.

With a string section and skeleton-attired backing singers intermittently joining them on stage, the band then continued with ‘Shoot The Runner’ and ‘Underdog’, replete with a laser show.

With Meighan telling the crowd to “give yourselves a round of applause for supporting such a good cause,” Kasabian then encouraged the audience to begin a chant of “Eez-Eh” before launching into the single of the same name.

Later, the band started with the intro to old track ‘Doberman’ before Meighan exited the stage leaving Pizzorno to take lead vocals on ‘Take Aim’. Returning, the whole band then continued with ‘Club Foot’, ‘Rewired’, new track ‘Treat’ and ‘Empire’ before concluding the main set.

With the crowd still chanting the riff from ‘Fire’, Kasabian then re-entered to the opening instrumental of ‘Switchblade Smiles’ before continuing with the track – taken from ‘Velociraptor!’. Playing ‘Vlad, the Impaler’, Meighan then addressed the crowd for the last time. “Thank you Shepherds Bush,” he began. “It’s been ten years since the first record, we’ve been together since 1997. It’s a long fucking time so thanks for sticking with us.” Kasabian then ended with ‘LSF’ before exiting.